Death toll from spurious liquor rises to 34

Bangalore/Hosur, May 19 (IANS) The death toll from consuming spurious liquor in Karnataka and Tamil Nadu rose to 34 Monday with nine more people losing their lives in the two states, police said. While five more people have died in the two states since Sunday night, over 40 were said to be in serious condition and on the verge of losing their eyesight, doctors in Bangalore and Hosur hospitals.

N. Chinnappayyan, 36, from a village in bordering Karnataka has already lost his sight, government officials in Hosur said.

Police said that four spurious liquor vendors, including a Bangalore-based gangster, have been arrested.

Deputy Inspector General of Police K. Shenbagaraman told reporters in Hosur that a man and a woman are being prosecuted under the Bootleggers’ Act.

“We have information that a liquor kingpin and his accomplice have been detained in Bangalore,” he added.

Five people, including a woman, had died in D.G. Halli in Bangalore late Sunday evening while 12 lost their lives in Kolar district, 68 km from Bangalore, and another eight in neighbouring Tamil Nadu earlier in the day.

Five people died in Narasapur village and another five in Teykal village in Kolar district and eight, including three women, died in Tamil Nadu’s Anaikaal village, bordering Karnataka. Dalit residents of Anaikaal had the liquor in the early hours of Sunday during the 13th-day rituals of a funeral. Three died after drinking what is suspected to be poisonous rectified spirit.

The poisonous liquor was suspected to have been bought in Karnataka by Tamil Nadu residents who regularly buy cheap liquor across the inter-state border.